Repair and prepare your turf this autumn
March 2023
There are two primary goals when we think about autumn nutrition. Early autumn is about maximising turf health and energy reserves to ensure the best turf quality in winter. Late autumn focuses on conditioning the turf for winter resilience and spring recovery.
During winter everything slows down so we need to build and store energy in the plant before soil temperatures drop. Soil microbial activity and nutrient availability declines leading to less root development and growth. With optimal nutrition leading into winter, both cool and warm season grasses can better survive the cold and use the stored energy for spring recovery.
Repairing
If turf has been knocked by summer stress or wear, there are several key products in the MATCHPLAY Superior Liquid range that can help.
MP ROOTS will stimulate root development and plant health in a well-balanced package. MP ROOTS not only improves phosphorus uptake in the cooler months, it also improves soil ecology which aids in turf recovery. MP VITALISE can be used on damaged turf to minimise plant stress and maximise amino acid availability for quick recovery. The amino acids in MP VITALISE help the turfs metabolism to build energy for increased resilience against disease and stress.
Areas suffering the aftermath of high traffic in summer will benefit from MP REFRESH to help the plant build and store energy and develop new shoot growth for faster recovery. MP REFRESH will also help with cell wall strength and soil nutrient levels. Additionally, kelp and its associate hormones in MP KELPLUS will increase leaf and shoot growth and speed up recovery.
Preparing
Later in autumn start focussing on preparing turf for winter and the related issues that will have an impact like low light, wet weather and shortened growing periods. Here the focus is on building the energy stores to benefit winter resilience and spring resurgence.
Late autumn is the last opportunity to boost the soil biology diversity prior to soil temperatures dropping significantly. MP PROMOTE has a high inoculum loading and will ensure a sustained soil ecology during winter and early spring will kick start speedy turf recovery. To sustain a diverse soil ecology use MP FOUNDATION and MP ENERGISE in conjunction to support nutrient availability through winter, again supporting spring resurgence.
Winter resilience is dependent on robust plant tissue and MP REINFORCE will help build plant toughness to increase wear tolerance and assist with phosphorus uptake for root development in spring.
Getting the best from granular fertilisers
Granulars are a great way to get larger amounts of nutrition into the soil, however as soil temperatures drop microbial activity slows as does the resulting liberation of nutrients from fertilisers into available forms in the soil. They are more effective when the soil temperatures are higher so using them earlier in Autumn is more efficient. MP FOUNDATION has been formulated specifically to bolster the mineralising activity and efficiency of granular fertilisers.
In summary, building healthy plants through autumn ensures your turf will maintain better quality and resilience through winter and recover more actively in spring.